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BT wants more women engineers

Oh, yes it does

Openreach - BT's access services division - has launched a major recruitment drive to tempt more women to become phone engineers.

According to correspondence published recently by regulator Ofcom, BT has a shortfall of several hundred engineers needed to carry out essential work.

The "Open2all" initiative unveiled today is meant to address this shortage and overcome the hurdles currently preventing women from taking up careers as telecoms engineers.

As part of the scheme BT wants to alter the "currently perceived male dominated environment synonymous with engineering to make the role more attractive to women". It is also looking at increasing flexible working practices such as job sharing and introducing child-friendly hours and other "work/life balance measures".

"Research shows that there is a huge business case for gender diversity - more women in the workforce can contribute to increased levels of innovation, creativity and productivity," Openreach exec Andrew Jones said.

"Openreach's primary role is to serve communications providers' customers to the best of our ability, and a more representative workforce will allow us to do that." ®